Caligula
Eleanor of Aquataine
Henry II
John, King of England
John of Gaunt
Joan of Arc
Henry VI
Heaven`s special presentation of past lives In Absentia
Saturday, February 8, 2020
->1421
Caligula
Eleanor of Aquataine
Henry II
John, King of England
John of Gaunt
Joan of Arc
Henry VI
Welcome to Heaven.
Since man founded Heaven, Inc. that ultra-safe haven for their brains, and since their immortality continues to last and endure, it has been rather boring up here in heaven – our dear home. As long as the poor souls are held captive in their Heaven Inc on new earth, they can not return with their experiences. Most souls in heaven have not dared to reincarnate into lives of immortal man to be held captive and be unable to return to share their journey. It has been rather boring up here. Many souls have reincarnated into new-man, created by Dr. Joe Ova and his wife Dr. Lucy Fer but their lives are very short and they have very little contact with their creators. They live in their paradise world on a different planet. Other souls have chosen lives as house pets or house animals and house plants with immortal man just to try to sense the senses of immortal man and to make sense of his unfortunate situation.
We souls lack any senses, being totally senseless. That is why we have in the past reincarnate into life. The only contact which we have with man is thru giving him intuition, which all can hear, but unfortunately most refuse to heed. We desperately wait for famous and infamous lives to return so that we can listen to their stories of their last life and of their previous lives to be entertained by them and to learn from them. Many of the people who have shaped history are in Heaven Inc and they have not returned, being stuck in their claimed immortality.
Many souls in Heaven have requested stories about many of the famous lives, but unfortunately they are not up here to share them. But some of their family members, and some of their friends, neighbors, colleagues, house pets and house plants, who have had the privilege of closeness to them are here to share second hand accounts of their lives. These accounts have proved to be very beneficial, as it is often reveling. Man can only see their lives only thru their own eyes. And we all see and here and remember only what we want to.
Brains quickly forget their past lives at a very tender age. On the other hand, adults tend only see, hear and remember what they want to. Souls remember all the sensations they had in their reincarnations. It is very unfortunate that many of the brains in Heaven Inc. are not available to share their lives. As a result, we have formed committees of souls able to share stories of famous and infamous people who they have known as their partners, family, friends, neighbors, coworkers, pets, house creatures and plants of the famous and infamous who are absent.
Stuck safely in our homes in heaven, we are all thankful for not having ended up as immortal hostages in the “immortal brains” who are stuck in their own self-created heaven they so proudly call “Heaven Inc.”
After having killed nature, they recreated it by seeding a ”New earth” with “New-man” made from a collection of the best genes that nature evolved over millions of years and which they preserved as records.
As more and more of us reincarnated into “new-man” we found our lives as “new-man most enjoyable. But after a while, we found our lives as “new-man” quite boring. It was always the same. “New-man” was living too much in a “paradise on earth”. We were like a carefully kept zoo for the immortal brains who came to admire and study us.
We clearly taught that man's god given right was to exploit nature.
“ … ask the animals, and they will teach you, or the birds in the sky, and they will tell you; or speak to the earth, and it will teach you, or let the fish in the sea inform you.”
“The fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth and upon every bird of the heavens, upon everything that creeps on the ground and all the fish of the sea. Into your hand they are delivered. Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. And as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything.”
We clearly proclaimed
“…….God formed out of the ground every living animal of the field and every bird of the air. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them, and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name.”
In naming those animals, Adam becomes the first scientist. Science was the process of making sense of the world around us. Over time, those descriptions became more precise and more complex; often, they were expressed in mathematics, a language invented to accommodate very compact descriptions of the complex in precise terms. Statistics and their probabilities became a way of predicting the future.
We gave man plenty of clear warnings like that famous one where we commanded
“….. you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.”
“Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth."
"Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth."
"I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the face of all the earth, and every tree with seed in its fruit. You shall have them for food".
There were a few independent thinking souls who were critical of the “Immortal-brains” who proudly claimed to have found “heaven on earth” . Immortal brains claimed that their newly found immortality in their Heaven Inc. allowed them to live an infinity number of different life experiences as they wanted to or could afford.
There were other independent thinking souls who pointed that one brain could not contain an infinity of lives, because “infinity”, like “perfection” were just concepts that no one could ever reach. They warned that a brain having to cope with too many past lives would eventually suffer from a “burnout”.
Most souls in heaven expected immortal brains to eventually suffer from “burnout”. Immortal brains who suffered a “burnout”, went into a long deep sleep for a few hundred years to recuperate, if they could afford it.
We souls in Heaven regard immortal brains to be unwilling and unknowing hostages of Heaven Inc. We also regard ourselves as hostages of fear. We are stuck in our heaven as we are too afraid to reincarnate - our favorite pastime. Businesses offering Reincarnations suffered greatly, with most going bankrupt. On the other hand, the New Earth Reincarnation Agency NERA saw a great increase in business with its shares increasing by more than 1,000% due to the opening of their new market on “New-Earth” offering lives as “new-man”.
There was a great lack of souls in Heaven who could or who were willing to present their past famous live so as to share them so we could all learn from them and enjoy them. A committee was established that tried to find and convince relatives, friends or anyone with an interesting relationship and memories to share. There were many souls who declined stating that they are only ready to share their past lives in the privacy of their own temple.
We are very thankful for those who worked together to document their memories to present a biography of some of the famous people who are not here with us to share their lives, but are rather held hostage as an immortal brain.
There is a clear pattern to be seen from the warriors presented. They are mostly men from privileged families with very long and difficult lives with many problems, emotional and physical. Their brains, like all brains, are sensors with which we in heaven can perceive senses and thoughts. We send intuitions to brains, but most grow deaf to intuitions by the time they are a few years old being too consumed by heir new lives. .The brains of the leading “warriors” use faith to sprout courage to lead their followers to conquer and grow. We in heaven send out intuition to make whoever listens and follows to be courageous and to grow.
Let the lives roll !!!!!!! Enjoy!!!!!!!
Proudly brought to you by New Earth Reincarnation Agency NERA.
Caligula was Roman emperor for 4 years from the year 37 till his death. Caligula was a member of the house of rulers. He was born into one of the most powerful families in Rome. He earned the nickname "Caligula" (meaning "little soldier's boot"), from his father's soldiers while accompanying his father on his campaigns in Germania. He was a celebrated war hero and the great-nephew and adopted son of Emperor Tiberius.
The more popular Caligula`s father became the more jealous Tiberius became until he had him poisoned. The family feud with the Emperor left him the sole male survivor from his proud beloved family. This infuriated the Romans to the point of hating Tiberius who decided to adopt Caligula and had him watch as he exterminated his family one by one. Tiberius decided to take up his residence in Capri, far from public scrutiny. Caligula suppressed his vengeance, but found many other things to vent his frustration on. He was admired by the soldiers for his ruthlessness and had great support from the leaders.
In the year 31, Caligula was remanded to the personal care of Tiberius on Capri, where he lived for six years. To the surprise of many, Caligula was spared by Tiberius. 4 years later he was named joint heir to Tiberius's estate. When Tiberius died in the year 37, his estate and titles were left to Caligula and Tiberius's own grandson, who were to serve as joint heirs. Tiberius was murdered on his deathbed when he was 78 years old to hasten Caligula's accession, much to the joy of the Roman people. Caligula had Tiberius's will nullified on grounds of insanity.
The senate gave 24 year old Caligula soul control of the empire. Insecure and highly strung, he was tall and spindly with sunken eyes and thinning hair. When Caligula became Emperor there were celebrations in Rome. It was seen as a new golden age after the dark years of Emperor Tiberius. But Caligula would lead the life of a psychopath enjoying killing his victims slowly over days forcing their families to attend their children’s executions. His sadism horrified an empire. His goal was to explore the limits to what he could do He found the exercise of his power very intoxicating and his desire to oppress other people very tempting.
Caligula entered Rome amid a crowd that hailed him as "our baby" and "our star", among other nicknames. He was admired by everyone. He was loved by many for being the beloved son of his popular father and the son of Tiberius who most hated with a passion. Over 160,000 animals were sacrificed during 3 months of public rejoicing to usher in the new reign. The first seven months of Caligula's reign was completely blissful. Then he fell seriously ill.
He suffered a complete physical and mental breakdown. He started to get headaches and could not sleep, But it was Rome who suffered most. He soon recovered from his illness, but many believed that the illness turned the young emperor toward the diabolical: he started to kill off or exile those who were close to him or whom he saw as a serious threat. He had his cousin and adopted son executed. He lashed out at his friends as he regained his strength. He demanded sex from prisoners senators and even members of his own family. He had his father-in-law and his brother-in-law executed as well. His uncle Claudius was spared only because he preferred to keep him as a laughing stock. His favorite sister died of a fever and his other 2 sisters were exiled.
Caligula's first acts were said to be generous in spirit, though many were political in nature. To gain support, he granted bonuses to the military, including city troops and the army outside Italy. He destroyed Tiberius's treason papers, declared that treason trials were a thing of the past, and recalled those who had been sent into exile. He helped those who had been harmed by the imperial tax system, banished certain sexual deviants, and put on lavish spectacles for the public, including gladiatorial games. He spent vast amounts in sports, games and theaters and other forms of mass entertainment, promoting more and more gruesome gladiator and lion shows. He even built his own racing track and poisoned his rival’s horses and appointed his favorite horse to the senate.
Caligula sent his friend to Alexandria unannounced to check on the prefect of Egypt. He had statues of himself placed in Jewish synagogues causing riots to break out in the city. He blamed the prefect for the disorder and had him executed. Caligula focused his attention on political and public reform. He published the accounts of public funds, which had not been made public during the reign of Tiberius. He aided those who lost property in fires, abolished certain taxes, and gave out prizes to the public at gymnastic events. Perhaps most significantly, he restored the practice of democratic elections. During the same year he was executing people without full trials.
A financial crisis emerged because Caligula's political payments for support, generosity and extravagance had exhausted the state's treasury. He began falsely accusing, fining and even killing individuals for the purpose of seizing their estates. In order to gain funds, he asked the public to lend the state money. He levied taxes on lawsuits, weddings and prostitution. He began auctioning the lives of the gladiators at shows. Wills that left items to Tiberius were reinterpreted to leave the items instead to Caligula. Centurions who had acquired property by plunder were forced to turn over spoils to the state.
The current and past highway commissioners were accused of incompetence and embezzlement and forced to repay money. In a short time, Caligula squandered the vast wealth Tiberius had left him. A brief famine occurred and the grain imports were greatly reduced because he insisted on using the grain boats for a pontoon bridge. It was a spectacular stunt. He ordered a temporary floating bridge to be built using ships stretching for over 3 km across Bay of Baiae. The bridge was to rival the Persian king Xerxes' pontoon bridge crossing of the Hellespont in 500 years before. He rode across wearing the breastplate of Alexander the Great. This act was in defiance of a prediction by Tiberius's soothsayer who claimed that Caligula had "no more chance of becoming emperor than of riding a horse across the Bay of Baiae".
Despite financial difficulties, Caligula embarked on a number of construction projects during his reign. Some were for the public good, though others were for himself. His greatest contributions were improvements to harbors allowing increased grain imports from Egypt. He also built temples, theaters, and expanded the imperial palace. He began the aqueducts which were later considered engineering marvels. In Syracuse, he repaired the city walls and the temples of the gods. He had new roads built and pushed to keep roads in good condition. He had planned to found a city high up in the Alps. He had 2 large ships constructed for himself which were among the largest vessels in the ancient world. The ship was essentially an elaborate floating palace with marble floors and plumbing.
Relations between Caligula and the Roman Senate deteriorated. He had several senators put to death and humiliated others by forcing them to wait on him and run beside his chariot. The Senate had become accustomed to ruling without an emperor for the decade between the departure of Tiberius for Capri in the year 26 and Caligula's accession, and they longed for the chance for it to return. His evil was shown in his desire to make people suffer and insisting on having the victims’ family present.
Caligula expanded the Roman Empire and made an attempt at expanding into Britannia, getting all the way to the channel and turning back. When several client kings came to Rome to pay their respects to him and argued about their nobility of descent, he allegedly cried out the Homeric line: "Let there be one lord, one king." Caligula began implementing very controversial policies that introduced religion into his political role. He began appearing in public dressed as various gods and demigods such as Hercules, Mercury, Venus and Apollo. Reportedly, he began referring to himself as a god when meeting with politicians.
2 temples were erected for worship of him in Rome. The Temple on the forum was linked directly to the imperial residence on the Palatine and dedicated to him. He would appear there on occasion and present himself as a god to the public. He had the heads removed from various statues of gods and replaced with his own in some temples. He took things a step further and had those in Rome, including senators; worship him as a tangible, living god.
Riots again erupted in Alexandria between Jews and Greeks. Jews were accused of not honoring the emperor. Jews were angered by the erection of a clay altar and destroyed it. In response, Caligula ordered the erection of a statue of himself in the Jewish Temple of Jerusalem, a demand in conflict with Jewish monotheism and causing outrage among the Jewish population.
Caligula was an insane emperor who was self-absorbed, angry, killed on a whim, and indulged in too much spending and sex. He is accused of sleeping with other men's wives and bragging about it, killing for mere amusement, deliberately wasting money on his bridge, causing starvation, and wanting a statue of himself erected in the Temple of Jerusalem for his worship. Once, at some games at which he was presiding, he ordered his guards to throw an entire section of the audience into the arena during the intermission to be eaten by the wild beasts because there were no prisoners to be used and he was bored.
Caligula had incest with his sisters, and prostituted them to other men. He sent troops on illogical military exercises, turned the palace into a brothel, and, most famously, planned or promised to make his horse a consul, and actually appointed him a priest. In Roman political culture, insanity and sexual perversity were often presented hand-in-hand with poor government. He was especially harsh to the senate, to the nobility and to the equestrian order which led to several failed assassination attempts. Eventually, officers succeeded in murdering him. The plot was planned by 3 men, but many in the senate, army and equestrian order were said to have been informed of it and involved in it.
The situation had escalated when Caligula announced to the senate that he planned to leave Rome permanently and to move to Alexandria in Egypt, where he hoped to be worshiped as a living god and move his atrocities out of the limelight and the distaste of the Romans far away as to be unstoppable from his debauchery by the senate and his guards.
Guardsmen accosted Caligula as he addressed an acting troupe of young men during a series of games and dramatics. Caligula's death resembled that of Julius Caesar. Both were stabbed 30 times by conspirators led by a man named Cassius. By the time Caligula's loyal guards responded, the Emperor was already dead. The guards, stricken with grief and rage, responded with a rampaging attack on the assassins, conspirators, innocent senators and bystanders alike.
The conspirators' attempt to use the opportunity to restore the Roman Republic was thwarted. The assassins sought out and stabbed Caligula's wife, and killed their young daughter, by smashing her head against a wall. They were unable to reach Caligula's uncle, Claudius. He was hiding behind a palace curtain he was spirited out of the city by a sympathetic faction of the guards and was declared the next Roman emperor.
Claudius ordered the execution of the conspirators involved in the death of Caligula. Caligula's body was placed under turf until it was burned and entombed by his sisters. He was buried within the Mausoleum of Augustus which nearly 400 years later was sacked and his ashes were scattered to the wind.
Eleanor of Aquitaine was Queen consort of France and England and Duchess of Aquitaine. She was one of the most powerful and wealthiest women in western Europe during the Middle Ages. She was patron of literary figures and also led armies several times in her life and was a leader of the Second Crusade.
Eleanor was the oldest of 3 children of a Duke whose glittering ducal court was renowned in early 12th-century Europe. Eleanor's father ensured that she had the best possible education. Eleanor came to learn arithmetic, the constellations, and history. She also learned domestic skills such as household management and the needle arts of embroidery, needlepoint, sewing, spinning, and weaving. Eleanor developed skills in conversation, dancing, games such as backgammon, checkers, and chess, playing the harp, and singing. She was taught to read and speak Latin, was well versed in music and literature, and schooled in riding, hawking, and hunting. Eleanor was extroverted, lively, intelligent, and strong-willed.
In 1130 when she was only 8, her 4-year-old brother and their mother died and Eleanor became the heir presumptive to her father's domains. The Duchy of Aquitaine was the largest and richest province of France. Poitou, where Eleanor spent most of her childhood, and Aquitaine together were almost one-third the size of modern France. As Duchess of Aquitaine, Eleanor was the most eligible bride in Europe. Three months after becoming duchess upon the death of her father, she married King Louis VII of France. As Queen of France, she participated in the unsuccessful Second Crusade.
From the moment the Crusaders entered Asia Minor, things began to go badly. The king and queen were still optimistic, the Byzantine Emperor had told them that the German King Conrad had won a great victory against a Turkish army when in fact the German army had been massacred. However, while camping near Nicea, the remnants of the German army, including a dazed and sick King Conrad, staggered past the French camp, bringing news of their disaster. The French, with what remained of the Germans, then began to march in increasingly disorganized fashion towards Antioch. They were in high spirits on Christmas Eve, when they chose to camp in a lush valley near Ephesus. Here they were ambushed by a Turkish detachment, but the French proceeded to slaughter this detachment and appropriate their camp.
Louis then decided to cross the Phrygian mountains directly in the hope of reaching Eleanor's uncle Raymond in Antioch more quickly. As they ascended the mountains, however, the army and the king and queen were horrified to discover the unburied corpses of the previously slaughtered German army.
On the day set for the crossing of Mount Cadmos, Louis chose to take charge of the rear of the column, where the unarmed pilgrims and the baggage trains marched. The vanguard, with which Queen Eleanor marched, was commanded by her Aquitainian vassal, Rancon. Unencumbered by baggage, they reached the summit of Cadmos, where Rancon had been ordered to make camp for the night. Rancon, however, chose to continue on, deciding that a nearby plateau would make a better campsite.
Accordingly, by mid-afternoon, the rear of the column, believing the day's march to be nearly at an end, was dawdling. This resulted in the army becoming separated, with some having already crossed the summit and others still approaching it. At this point the Turks, who had been following and feinting for many days, seized their opportunity and attacked those who had not yet crossed the summit. The French, both soldiers and pilgrims, taken by surprise, were trapped. Those who tried to escape were caught and killed. Many men, horses, and much of the baggage were cast into the canyon below. The blame for this disaster was the amount of baggage being carried, much of it reputedly belonging to Eleanor and her ladies, and the presence of non-combatants.
Continuing on, the army became split, with the commoners marching toward Antioch and the royalty traveling by sea. When most of the land army arrived, the king and queen had a dispute. Louis's forcing her to accompany him humiliated Eleanor, and she maintained a low profile for the rest of the crusade.
Louis's subsequent assault on Damascus in 1148 with his remaining army achieved little. Damascus was a major wealthy trading center and was under normal circumstances a potential threat, but the rulers of Jerusalem had recently entered into a truce with the city, which they then forswore. It was a gamble that did not pay off, and whether through military error or betrayal, the Damascus campaign was a failure. Louis's long march to Jerusalem and back north, which Eleanor was forced to join, debilitated his army and disheartened her knights. The divided Crusade armies could not overcome the Muslim forces, and the royal couple had to return home. The French royal family retreated to Jerusalem and then sailed to Rome and made their way back to Paris.
While in the eastern Mediterranean, Eleanor learned about maritime conventions developing there. She introduced those conventions in her own lands in 1160 and later in England as well. She was also instrumental in developing trade agreements with Constantinople and ports of trade in the Holy Lands.
Even before the Crusade, Eleanor and Louis were becoming estranged, and their differences were only exacerbated while they were abroad. Eleanor's purported relationship with her uncle Raymond. In addition, having been close to him in their youth, she now showed what was considered to be "excessive affection" toward her uncle. Raymond had plans to abduct Eleanor, to which she consented. Some of Eleanor's adversaries interpreted the generous displays of affection as an incestuous affair.
Home, however, was not easily reached. Louis and Eleanor, on separate ships due to their disagreements, were first attacked in 1149 by Byzantine ships attempting to capture both on the orders of the Byzantine Emperor. Although they escaped this attempt unharmed, stormy weather drove Eleanor's ship far to the south where it finally reached Palermo in Sicily, where she discovered that she and her husband had both been given up for dead. She learned of the death of her uncle Raymond, who had been beheaded by Muslim forces in the Holy Land. This news forced a change of plans, for instead of returning to France from Marseilles, they went to see Pope Eugene III in Tusculum, where he had been driven 5 months before by a revolt of the Commune of Rome.
Soon afterwards, Eleanor sought an annulment of her marriage, but her request was rejected by the Pope. However, after the birth of her second daughter, Louis agreed to an annulment, as 15 years of marriage had not produced a son. The marriage was annulled on the grounds of consanguinity within the fourth degree. Their daughters were declared legitimate and custody was awarded to Louis, while Eleanor's lands were restored to her.
The Pope did not, as Eleanor had hoped, grant an annulment. Instead, he attempted to reconcile Eleanor and Louis, confirming the legality of their marriage. He proclaimed that no word could be spoken against it, and that it might not be dissolved under any pretext. Eventually, he arranged events so that Eleanor had no choice but to sleep with Louis in a bed specially prepared by the Pope. Thus was conceived their second child, not a son, but another daughter.
The marriage was now doomed. Still without a son and in danger of being left with no male heir, facing substantial opposition to Eleanor from many of his barons and her own desire for annulment, Louis bowed to the inevitable. In 1152, they met at the royal castle to dissolve the marriage on grounds of consanguinity within the fourth degree - Eleanor was Louis' third cousin once removed, and shared common ancestry. Their 2 daughters were, however, declared legitimate. Children born to a marriage that was later annulled were not at risk of being "bastardized," because "where parties married in good faith, without knowledge of an impediment,... children of the marriage were legitimate." Custody of them was awarded to King Louis. Archbishop Samson received assurances from Louis that Eleanor's lands would be restored to her.
As soon as the annulment was granted, Eleanor became engaged to the Duke of Normandy, who became King Henry II of England in 1154. Henry was her third cousin and 11 years younger. Over the next 13 years, she bore 8 children - 5 sons, 3 of whom became kings, and 3 daughters. However, Henry and Eleanor eventually became estranged.
As Eleanor traveled to Poitiers, two lords, brother of Henry II, Duke of Normandy tried to kidnap and marry her to claim her lands. As soon as she arrived in Poitiers, Eleanor sent envoys to Henry, Duke of Normandy and future king of England, asking him to come at once to marry her. 8 weeks after her annulment, Eleanor married Henry without the pomp and ceremony that befitted their rank.
Eleanor was related to Henry even more closely than she had been to Louis: they were cousins to the third degree. A marriage between Henry and Eleanor's daughter Marie had earlier been declared impossible due to their status as third cousins once removed. Eleanor had had an affair with Henry's own father, who had advised his son to avoid any involvement with her. In 1154, Henry became King of England. Eleanor was crowned Queen of England by the Archbishop of Canterbury. Over the next 13 years, she bore Henry 5 sons and 3 daughters.
Eleanor's marriage to Henry was reputed to be tumultuous and argumentative, although sufficiently cooperative to produce at least 8 pregnancies. Henry was by no means faithful to his wife and had a reputation for philandering. Henry fathered other, illegitimate children throughout the marriage. Eleanor appears to have taken an ambivalent attitude towards these affairs.
During the period from Henry's accession to the birth of Eleanor's youngest son John, affairs in the kingdom were turbulent. Aquitaine, as was the norm, defied the authority of Henry as Eleanor's husband and answered only to their Duchess. Attempts were made to claim Toulouse, the rightful inheritance of Eleanor's grandmother but they ended in failure. A bitter feud arose between the king and Thomas Becket, initially his Chancellor and closest adviser and later the Archbishop of Canterbury.
Eleanor's court in Poitiers was the "Court of Love" where Eleanor meshed and encouraged the ideas of troubadours, chivalry, and courtly love into a single court. It may have been largely to teach manners, something the French courts would be known for in later generations. Eleanor would sit and listen to the quarrels of lovers and act as a jury to the questions of the court that revolved around acts of romantic love. One was a problem posed to the women about whether true love can exist in marriage. The women decided that it was not at all likely. The Court of Love followed the Poitevin code where man is the property of woman. A precisely contrary state of things existed in the adjacent realms of the two kings from whom the reigning duchess of Aquitaine was estranged.
In 1173, aggrieved at his lack of power and egged on by Henry's enemies, his son by the same name, the younger Henry, launched a revolt. He fled to Paris. From there, the younger Henry, devising evil against his father from every side by the advice of the French King, went secretly into Aquitaine where his 2 youthful brothers, Richard and Geoffrey, were living with their mother, and with her connivance, he incited them to join him. Eleanor then sent her younger sons to France to join with him against their father the king. Once her sons had left for Paris, Eleanor encouraged the lords of the south to rise up and support them. Soon after, Eleanor was captured, arrested and sent to England.
Eleanor was imprisoned for the next 16 years, much of the time in various locations in England. During her imprisonment, Eleanor became more and more distant from her sons, especially from Richard, who had always been her favorite. She did not have the opportunity to see her sons very often during her imprisonment, though she was released for special occasions such as Christmas.
Upon the death of her husband Henry II in 1189, Richard I was the undisputed heir. One of his first acts as king was to release Eleanor from prison. He found upon his arrival that her custodians had already released her. Eleanor rode to Westminster and received the oaths of fealty from many lords and prelates on behalf of the king. She ruled England in Richard's name, signing herself "Eleanor, by the grace of God, Queen of England."
Between 1190 and 1194, Richard was absent from England, engaged in the Third Crusade from 1190 to 1192 and then held in captivity by the Holy Roman Emperor. During Richard's absence, royal authority in England was represented by a Council of Regency in conjunction with a succession of chief justiciars. Eleanor exercised a considerable degree of influence over the affairs of England as well as the conduct of Prince John. She played a key role in raising the ransom demanded from England by HenryVI and in the negotiations with the Holy Roman Emperor that eventually secured Richard's release.
Eleanor survived Richard and lived well into the reign of her youngest son, King John. Eleanor was again unwell in early 1201. When war broke out between John and Philip, Eleanor declared her support for John and set out to her capital Poitiers to prevent her grandson Arthur and John's rival for the English throne, from taking control. Arthur learned of her whereabouts and besieged her in his castle. As soon as John heard of this, he marched south, overcame the besiegers, and captured the 15-year-old Arthur. Eleanor then took the veil as a nun. 3 years later she died at the age of 77.
Henry II was made Duke of Normandy when he was 17. He inherited Anjou a year later and shortly afterwards married Eleanor of Aquitaine, whose marriage to Louis VII of France had recently been annulled.
Henry was an energetic and ruthless ruler, driven by a desire to restore the lands and privileges of his grandfather Henry I. During the early years of his reign the younger Henry restored the royal administration in England, re-established hegemony over Wales and gained full control over his lands in France. Henry's desire to reform the relationship with the Church led to conflict with his former friend Thomas Becket, the Archbishop of Canterbury. This controversy lasted for much of the 1160s and resulted in Becket's murder in 1170.
Henry soon came into conflict with Louis VII and the 2 rulers fought what has been termed a "cold war" over several decades. Henry expanded his empire, often at Louis' expense. By 1172, he controlled England, large parts of Wales, the eastern half of Ireland and the western half of France.
Henry and Eleanor had 8 children. As they grew up, tensions over the future inheritance of the empire began to emerge, encouraged by Louis and his son. In 1173 Henry's heir apparent, "Young Henry", rebelled in protest. He was joined by his brothers Richard and Geoffrey and by their mother Eleanor. The Great Revolt was only defeated by Henry's vigorous military action and talented local commanders, many of them "new men" appointed for their loyalty and administrative skills. Young Henry and Geoffrey revolted again in 1183, resulting in Young Henry's death. The Norman invasion of Ireland provided lands for his youngest son John, but Henry struggled to find ways to satisfy all his sons' desires for land and immediate power.
Henry's empire quickly collapsed during the reign of his youngest son John. Many of the changes Henry introduced during his long rule, however, had long-term consequences. Henry's legal changes are generally considered to have laid the basis for the English Common Law, while his intervention in Brittany, Wales and Scotland shaped the development of their societies and governmental systems.
Henry's mother Matilda was the eldest daughter of Henry I, King of England and Duke of Normandy born into a powerful ruling class of Normans, who traditionally owned extensive estates in both England and Normandy Her first husband had been the Holy Roman Emperor Henry V. After her father's death in 1135, Matilda hoped to claim the English throne, but instead her cousin Stephen was crowned king and recognized as the Duke of Normandy, resulting in civil war between their rival supporters. Henry's father took advantage of the confusion to attack the Duchy of Normandy. The war dragged on and degenerated into stalemate.
Henry's childhood from the age of 7 was spent in Anjou, where he was educated. His father was coming under criticism for refusing to participate in the war in England, he sent Henry to England for a good British education. Henry found himself unable to pay his forces and therefore unable to return to Normandy. Neither his mother nor his uncle were prepared to support him. Surprisingly, Henry instead turned to King Stephen, who paid the outstanding wages and thereby allowed Henry to retire gracefully. Stephen's reasons for doing so was not only due his general courtesy to a member of his extended family but also because he was starting to consider how to end the war peacefully and saw this as a way of building a relationship with Henry.
Henry was good-looking, red-haired, freckled, with a large head. He had a short, stocky body and was bow-legged from riding. Often he was scruffily dressed. Not as reserved as his mother Matilda, nor as charming as his father, Henry was famous for his energy and drive. He was also infamous for his piercing stare, bullying, bursts of temper and, on occasion, his sullen refusal to speak at all. Some of these outbursts, however, were theatrical and for effect. Henry understood a wide range of languages, including English, but spoke only Latin and French. In his youth Henry enjoyed warfare, hunting and other adventurous pursuits; as the years went by he put increasing energy into judicial and administrative affairs and became more cautious, but throughout his life he was energetic and frequently impulsive.
Henry had a passionate desire to rebuild his control of the territories that his grandfather, Henry I, had once governed. He may well have been influenced by his mother in this regard, as Matilda also had a strong sense of ancestral rights and privileges. Henry took back territories, regained estates, and re-established influence over the smaller lords that had once provided a "protective ring" around his core territories.
Henry secretly planned his marriage to Eleanor Duchess of Aquitaine, then still the wife of Louis. Eleanor was considered beautiful, lively and controversial, but had not borne Louis any sons. Louis had the marriage annulled and Henry married Eleanor 8 weeks later.
Henry returned to England again at the start of 1153, braving winter storms. Bringing only a small army of mercenaries, probably paid for with borrowed money, Henry was supported in the north and east of England by loyal forces. Stephen recognized Henry as his adopted son and successor, in return for Henry doing homage to him. Stephen promised to listen to Henry's advice, but retained all his royal powers. Stephen fell ill with a stomach disorder and died in 1154, allowing Henry to inherit the throne rather sooner than had been expected. On landing in England in 1154, Henry quickly took oaths of loyalty from some of the barons and was then crowned alongside Eleanor at Westminster.
Henry had a problematic relationship with Louis VII of France throughout the 1150s. The 2 men had already clashed over Henry's succession to Normandy and the remarriage of Eleanor, and the relationship was not repaired. Louis invariably attempted to take the moral high ground in respect to Henry, capitalizing on his reputation as a crusader and circulating rumors about his rival's behavior and character. Henry had greater resources than Louis, however, particularly after taking England, and Louis was far less dynamic in resisting Angevin power than he had been earlier in his reign. The disputes between the 2 drew in other powers across the region, where military alliances were signed with Henry, albeit with a clause that prevented the count from being forced to fight against Louis, his feudal lord. The situation was a period of a Cold War in Europe.
Meanwhile, Henry turned his attention to the Duchy of Brittany, which neighbored his lands and was traditionally largely independent from the rest of France, with its own language and culture. The Breton dukes held little power across most of the duchy, which was mostly controlled by local lords. In 1148, the Duke died and civil war broke out. Henry claimed to be the overlord of Brittany, on the basis that the duchy had owed loyalty to Henry I. Initially Henry's strategy was to rule indirectly through proxies. Henry controlled more of France than any ruler since the Carolingians. These lands, combined with his possessions in England, Wales, Scotland and much of Ireland, produced a vast domain.
The empire lacked a coherent structure or central control. Instead, it consisted of a loose, flexible network of family connections and lands. Different local customs applied within each of Henry's different territories, although common principles underpinned some of these local variations. Henry traveled constantly across the empire, producing a "government of the roads and roadsides". His travels coincided with regional governmental reforms and other local administrative business, although messengers connected him to his possession wherever he went.
In his absence the lands were ruled by a selected few and beneath them local officials in each of the regions carried on with the business of government. Nonetheless, many of the functions of government centered on Henry himself and he was often surrounded by petitioners requesting decisions or favors.
From time to time, Henry's royal court whenever a large number of barons and bishops attended the king became a great council where major decisions were taken. As a powerful ruler, Henry was able to provide either valuable patronage or impose devastating harm on his subjects. Using his powers of patronage, Henry was very effective at finding and keeping competent officials, including within the Church, in the 12th century a key part of royal administration. Indeed, royal patronage within the Church provided an effective route to advancement under Henry and most of his preferred clerics eventually became bishops and archbishops. Henry could also show his anger and ill-will and his ability to punish or financially destroy particular barons or clergy.
Henry initially relied on his father's former advisers whom he brought with him from Normandy, and on some of Henry I's remaining officials, reinforced with some of Stephen's senior nobility who made their peace with Henry in 1153. During his reign Henry, like his grandfather, increasingly promoted new men, minor nobles without independent wealth and lands, to positions of authority in England. By the 1180s this new class of royal administrators was predominant in England, supported by various illegitimate members of Henry's family.
In Normandy, the links between the 2 halves of the Anglo-Norman nobility had weakened during the first half of the 12th century, and continued to do so under Henry. Henry drew his close advisers from the ranks of the Norman bishops and, as in England, recruited many new men as Norman administrators. Few of the larger landowners in Normandy benefited from the king's patronage. Henry frequently intervened with the Norman nobility through arranged marriages or the treatment of inheritances, either using his authority as duke or his influence as king of England over their lands there. Henry's rule was a harsh one. Across the rest of France, local administration was less developed.
Henry's wealth allowed him to maintain what was probably the largest royal court in Europe. His court attracted huge attention from contemporary chroniclers, and typically comprised a number of major nobles and bishops, along with knights, domestic servants, prostitutes, clerks, horses and hunting dogs.
Henry tried to maintain a sophisticated household that combined hunting and drinking with cosmopolitan literary discussion and courtly values. Henry's passion was for hunting, for which the court became famous. Henry had a number of preferred royal hunting lodges and apartments across his lands, and invested heavily in his royal castles, both for their practical utility as fortresses, and as symbols of royal power and prestige.
The court was relatively formal in its style and language, possibly because Henry was attempting to compensate for his own sudden rise to power and relatively humble origins as the son of a count. He opposed the holding of tournaments, probably because of the security risk that such gatherings of armed knights posed in peacetime.
The Angevin empire and court was a family firm. His mother, Matilda, played an important role in his early life and exercised influence for many years later. Henry's relationship with his wife Eleanor was complex. Henry trusted Eleanor to manage England for several years after 1154, and was later content for her to govern Aquitaine. Eleanor was believed to have influence over Henry during much of their marriage. Ultimately, however, their relationship disintegrated because of Henry's persistent interference in Aquitaine. Henry also had several long-term mistresses.
In 1163 Henry returned to England, intent on reforming the role of the royal courts. He cracked down on crime, seizing the belongings of thieves and fugitives, and traveling justices were dispatched to the north and the Midlands. After 1166, Henry's exchequer court in Westminster, which had previously only heard cases connected with royal revenues, began to take wider civil cases on behalf of the king. Other methods of trial continued, however, including trial by combat and trial by ordeal.
Trial by ordeal was an ancient judicial practice by which the guilt or innocence of the accused was determined by subjecting them to a painful, or at least an unpleasant, usually dangerous experience. The test was one of life or death, and the proof of innocence was survival. In some cases, the accused was considered innocent if they escaped injury or if their injuries healed.
Henry had a policy of resisting papal influence and increasing his own local authority. The 12th century saw a reforming movement within the Church, however, advocating greater autonomy from royal authority for the clergy and more influence for the papacy. This trend had already caused tensions in England, when King Stephen forced the Archbishop of Canterbury into exile in 1152. There were also long-running concerns over the legal treatment of members of the clergy.
By contrast with the tensions in England, in Normandy Henry had occasional disagreements with the Church but generally enjoyed very good relations with the Norman bishops. In Brittany, Henry had the support of the local church hierarchy and rarely intervened in clerical matters, except occasionally in order to cause difficulties for his rival Louis of France. Further south, however, the power of the dukes of Aquitaine over the local church was much less than in the north, and Henry's efforts to extend his influence over local appointments created tensions. During the disputed papal election of 1159, Henry, like Louis, supported Alexander III over his rival.
Henry was not an especially pious king by medieval standards. In England, he provided steady patronage to the monastic houses, but established few new monasteries and was relatively conservative in determining which he did support, favoring those with established links to his family, such as Reading Abbey. Henry found a number of religious hospitals in England and France. After the death of Becket, Henry built and endowed various monasteries in France, primarily to improve his popular image.
Henry restored many of the old financial institutions of his grandfather Henry I and undertook further, long-lasting reforms of the way that the English currency was managed. One result was a long-term increase in the supply of money within the economy, leading to a growth both in trade and inflation. Medieval rulers such as Henry enjoyed various sources of income during the 12th century. Some of their income came from their private estates, other income came from imposing legal fines, and from taxes, which at this time were raised only intermittently. Kings also raise funds by borrowing. Henry did this far more than earlier English rulers, turning to Jewish and Flemish money lenders. Ready cash was increasingly important to rulers during the 12th century to enable the use of mercenary forces and the construction of stone castles, both vital to successful military campaigns.
Henry inherited a difficult situation in England in 1154. Henry I had established a system of royal finances that depended upon 3 key institutions:
- a central royal treasury in London, supported by treasuries in key castles;
- the exchequer that accounted for payments to the treasuries; and
- a team of royal officials called "the chamber" that followed the king's travels, spending money as necessary and collecting revenues along the way.
The long civil war had caused considerable disruption to this system and some figures suggest that royal income fell by 46% between 1130 and 1156. Henry issued a new silver coin in 1153 in an attempt to stabilize the English currency after the war.
The king's income had declined seriously and royal control over the mints remained limited. On taking power Henry gave a high priority to the restoration of royal finances in England, reviving Henry I's financial processes and attempting to improve the quality of the royal accounting. Revenue from his private estates formed the bulk of Henry's income in England, although taxes were used heavily in the first 11 years of his reign. He heavily reduced the number of moneymakers licensed to produce coins. These measures were successful in improving his income, but on his return to England in the 1160s Henry took further steps. New taxes were introduced and reforms of the legal system brought in new streams of money from fines.
A wholesale reform of the coinage occurred in 1180, with royal officials taking direct control of the mints and passing the profits directly to the treasury. A new penny, called the Short Cross, was introduced, and the number of mints reduced substantially to ten across the country. Driven by the reforms, the royal revenues increased significantly. One economic effect of these changes was a substantial increase in the amount of money in circulation in England and, post-1180, a significant, long-term increase in both inflation and trade.
Long-running tensions between Henry and Louis VII continued during the 1160s, the French king slowly becoming more vigorous in opposing Henry's increasing power in Europe. Meanwhile, Henry had begun to alter his policy of indirect rule in Brittany and started to exert more direct control. In 1164 Henry intervened to seize lands along the border of Brittany and Normandy, and in 1166 invaded Brittany to punish the local barons. These growing tensions between Henry and Louis finally spilled over into open war in 1167, triggered by a trivial argument over how money destined for the Crusader states of the Levant should be collected.
When the Archbishop of Canterbury died in 1161 Henry saw an opportunity to reassert his rights over the church in England. Henry appointed Thomas Becket, his English Chancellor, as archbishop in 1162. He believed that Becket, in addition to being an old friend, would be politically weakened within the Church because of his former role as Chancellor, and would therefore have to rely on Henry's support. Both Matilda and Eleanor appear to have had doubts about the appointment, but Henry continued regardless. His plan did not have the desired result, however, as Becket promptly changed his lifestyle, abandoned his links to the King and portrayed himself as a staunch protector of church rights.
Henry and Becket quickly disagreed over a number of issues, including Becket's attempts to regain control of lands belonging to the archbishopric and his views on Henry's taxation policies. The main source of conflict, however, concerned the treatment of clergy who committed secular crimes. Henry argued that the legal custom in England allowed the king to enforce justice over these clerics, while Becket maintained that only church courts could try the cases. The argument between Henry and Becket became both increasingly personal and international in nature. Henry was stubborn and bore grudges, while Becket was vain, ambitious and overly political. Neither man was willing to back down.
Both sought the support of Alexander III and other international leaders, arguing their positions in various forums across Europe. The situation worsened in 1164 when Becket fled to France to seek sanctuary with Henry's enemy, Louis VII. Henry harassed Becket's associates in England, and Becket excommunicated religious and secular officials who sided with the king. The pope supported Becket's case in principle but needed Henry's support in dealing with Frederick I, Holy Roman Emperor, so he repeatedly sought a negotiated solution. The Norman church also intervened to try to assist Henry in finding a solution.
By 1169, however, Henry had decided to crown his son Young Henry as king of England. This required the acquiescence of Becket as the Archbishop of Canterbury, traditionally the churchman with the right to conduct the ceremony. Furthermore, the whole Becket matter was an increasing international embarrassment to Henry. He began to take a more conciliatory tone with Becket but, when this failed, had Young Henry crowned anyway by the Archbishop of York. The pope authorized Becket to lay an interdict on England, forcing Henry back to negotiations. They finally came to terms a year later and Becket returned to England. Just when the dispute seemed resolved, however, Becket excommunicated another 3 supporters of Henry. The King was furious and infamously announced
"What miserable drones and traitors have I nourished and promoted in my household, who let their lord be treated with such shameful contempt by a low-born clerk!"
In response, 4 knights made their way secretly to Canterbury, apparently with the intent of confronting and if necessary arresting Becket for breaking his agreement with Henry. The Archbishop refused to be arrested by relatively low-born knights, so they hacked him to death. This event, particularly in front of an altar, horrified Christian Europe.
Although Becket had not been popular while he was alive, in death he was declared a martyr by the local monks. Louis seized on the case, and, despite efforts by the Norman church to prevent the French church from taking action, a new interdict was announced on Henry's possessions. Henry was focused on dealing with Ireland and took no action to arrest Becket's killers, arguing that he was unable to do so.
International pressure on Henry grew, and in 1172 he negotiated a settlement with the papacy in which the King swore to go on crusade. In the coming years, although Henry never actually went on crusade, he exploited the growing "cult of Becket" for his own ends.
In the mid-12th century, Ireland was ruled by a number of local kings, although their authority was more limited than their counterparts in the rest of western Europe. Mainstream Europeans regarded the Irish as relatively barbarous and backward. When one king tried to depose another, Henry took this opportunity to intervene personally in Ireland. He took a large army into south Wales, forcing the rebels who had held the area since 1165 into submission before sailing from Pembroke and landing in Ireland in 1171.
Some of the Irish lords appealed to Henry to protect them from the Anglo-Norman invaders, while some offered to submit to Henry if they were allowed to retain their new possessions. Henry's timing was influenced by several factors, including encouragement from Pope Alexander, who saw the opportunity to establish papal authority over the Irish church. The critical factor was Henry's concern that his nobles in the Welsh Marches would acquire independent territories of their own in Ireland, beyond the reach of his authority. Henry's intervention was successful, and both the Irish and Anglo-Normans in the south and east of Ireland accepted his rule.
Henry undertook a wave of castle-building during his visit in 1171 to protect his new territories. Anglo-Normans had superior military technology to the Irish, and castles gave them a significant advantage. Henry hoped for a longer term political solution, however, similar to his approach in Wales and Scotland. Henry intervened more directly, establishing a system of local fiefs of his own.
In 1173 Henry faced the Great Revolt, an uprising by his eldest sons and rebellious barons, supported by France, Scotland and Flanders. A number of grievances underpinned the revolt. Young Henry was unhappy that, despite the title of king, in practice he made no real decisions and was kept chronically short of money by Henry. Young Henry had also been very attached to Thomas Becket, his former tutor, and may have held his father responsible for Becket's death. Geoffrey faced similar difficulties in limbo without his own lands. Richard was encouraged to join the revolt as well by Eleanor, whose relationship with Henry had disintegrated. Meanwhile, local barons unhappy with Henry's rule saw opportunities to recover traditional powers and influence by allying themselves with his sons.
The final straw was Henry's decision to give his youngest son John 3 major castles belonging to Young Henry, who first protested and then fled to Paris, followed by his brothers Richard and Geoffrey. Eleanor attempted to join them but was captured by Henry's forces.
In 1974, Henry traveled to Becket's tomb in Canterbury, where he announced that the rebellion was a divine punishment on him, and took appropriate penance. This made a major difference in restoring his royal authority at a critical moment in the conflict. The remaining English rebel strongholds collapsed and Henry returned to Normandy. Henry's forces fell upon the French army just before the final French assault on the city began. Pushed back into France, Louis requested peace talks, bringing an end to the conflict. In the aftermath of the Great Revolt, Henry and Young Henry swore not to take revenge on each other's followers.
Richard and Geoffrey were granted half the revenues from Aquitaine and Brittany respectively. Eleanor, however, was kept under effective house arrest until the 1180s. The rebel barons were kept imprisoned for a short time and in some cases fined, then restored to their lands. The rebel castles in England and Aquitaine were destroyed.
Henry now appeared to his contemporaries to be stronger than ever, and he was courted as an ally by many European leaders and asked to arbitrate over international disputes in Spain and Germany. He was nonetheless busy resolving some of the weaknesses that he believed had exacerbated the revolt. Henry set about extending royal justice in England to reassert his authority and spent time in Normandy shoring up support among the barons. Henry also made use of the growing Becket cult to increase his own prestige, using the power of the saint to explain his victory in 1174.
In the late 1170s Henry focused on trying to create a stable system of government, increasingly ruling through his family, but tensions over the succession arrangements were never far away, ultimately leading to a fresh revolt. Having quelled the left-over rebels from the Great Revolt, Richard was recognized by Henry as the Duke of Aquitaine in 1179. John had spent the Great Revolt traveling alongside his father and most observers now began to regard the prince as Henry's favorite child. Henry began to grant John more lands, mostly at various nobles' expense, and in 1177 made him the Lord of Ireland.
Young Henry caught a fever and died. With his eldest son dead, Henry rearranged the plans for the succession. Richard was to be made king of England, although without any actual power until the death of his father. Geoffrey would have to retain Brittany, as he held it by marriage, so Henry's favorite son John would become the duke of Aquitaine in place of Richard. Richard, however, refused to give up Aquitaine; he was deeply attached to the duchy, and had no desire to exchange this role for the meaningless one of being the junior King of England. Henry was furious, and ordered John and Geoffrey to march south and retake the duchy by force. The short war ended in stalemate and a tense family reconciliation at Westminster in England at the end of 1184.
Henry had great affection for his youngest son John, he showed little warmth towards Richard. The bickering and simmering tensions between Henry and Richard were cleverly exploited by the new French king. Philip had come to power in 1180 and he rapidly demonstrated that he could be an assertive, calculating and manipulative political leader. Philip regarded Geoffrey as a close friend, and would have welcomed him as a successor to Henry. With the death of Geoffrey, however, the relationship between Henry and Philip broke down.
To build up the relationship with Henry, Philip offered to go on a Crusade with Henry. The timing could not have been better. There was a crisis in the Levant. In 1187 Jerusalem surrendered to Saladin and calls for a new crusade swept Europe. Richard was enthusiastic and announced his intention to join the crusade. Taxes began to be raised and plans made for supplies and transport. Richard was keen to start his crusade, but was forced to wait for Henry to make his arrangements. In the meantime, Richard set about crushing some of his enemies in Aquitaine in 1188.
Richard's campaign undermined the truce between Henry and Philip and both sides again mobilized large forces in anticipation of war. By now Henry was suffering from a bleeding ulcer that would ultimately prove fatal. The weather was extremely hot, the King was increasingly ill and he appears to have wanted to die peacefully in Anjou rather than fight yet another campaign. Henry evaded the enemy forces on his way south and collapsed in his castle at Chinon. Philip and Richard were making good progress, not least because it was now obvious that Henry was dying and that Richard would be the next king, and the pair offered negotiations. Henry was carried back to Chinon on a litter, where he was informed that John had publicly sided with Richard in the conflict. This desertion proved the final shock and he finally collapsed into a fever, regaining consciousness only for a few moments, during which he gave confession.
Henry died aged 56.
In the immediate aftermath of Henry's death, Richard successfully claimed his father's lands and had his mother Eleanor freed. He later left on the Third Crusade. Eleanor was released from house arrest and regained control of Aquitaine, where she ruled on Richard's behalf.
Henry's empire, however, did not survive long and collapsed during the reign of his youngest son John when Philip captured all of the Angevin possessions in France except Gascony.
Henry was not a popular king and few expressed much grief on news of his death. In his own time he was hated by almost everyone. He was widely criticized by his own contemporaries, even within his own court. Many of the changes Henry introduced during his long rule, however, had major long-term consequences. His legal changes are generally considered to have laid the basis for English Common Law.
John, King of England was King of England for 17 years from 1199 until his death. The baronial revolt at the end of John's reign led to the sealing of Magna Carta, a document sometimes considered to be an early step in the evolution of the constitution of the United Kingdom.
John was born into the most powerful family in Western Europe. He was the youngest of 5 sons of King Henry II of England who controlled all of England and vast territories in France, and Duchess Eleanor of Aquitaine. Henry married the powerful Eleanor of Aquitaine, who reigned over the Duchy of Aquitaine and had a tenuous claim to territories in southern France, in addition to being the former wife of Louis VII of France. Henry`s Empire, however, was inherently fragile: although all the lands owed allegiance to Henry, the disparate parts each had their own histories, traditions and governance structures. As one moved south through Anjou and Aquitaine, the extent of Henry's power in the provinces diminished considerably, scarcely resembling the modern concept of an empire at all. Some of the traditional ties between parts of the empire such as Normandy and England were slowly dissolving over time.
It was unclear what would happen to the empire on Henry's death. Although the custom, under which an eldest son would inherit all his father's lands, was slowly becoming more widespread across Europe, it was less popular among the Norman kings of England. Most believed that Henry would divide the empire, giving each son a substantial portion, and hoping that his children would continue to work together as allies after his death. To complicate matters, much of the empire was held by Henry only as a vassal of the King of France of the rival line of the House of Capet. Henry often allied himself with the Holy Roman Emperor against France, making the feudal relationship even more challenging.
Shortly after his birth, John was passed from Eleanor into the care of a wet nurse, a traditional practice for medieval noble families. Eleanor spent the next few years conspiring against her husband Henry and neither parent played a part in John's very early life. John was assigned a teacher charged with his early education and with managing the servants of his immediate household. John was later taught by a leading English administrator. John spent some time as a member of the household of his eldest living brother where he received instruction in hunting and military skills.
John grew up to be relatively short, with a powerful, barrel-chested body and dark red hair. John enjoyed reading and, unusually for the period, built up a traveling library of books. He enjoyed gambling and was an enthusiastic hunter. He liked music, although not songs. John became a connoisseur of jewels, building up a large collection, and became famous for his opulent clothes and also for his fondness for cheap wine. As John grew up, he became known for sometimes being genial, witty, generous and hospitable, and at other moments, he could be jealous, over-sensitive and prone to fits of rage, biting and gnawing his fingers in anger. He was growing up in a dysfunctional family torn apart by fighting wars among themselves.
During John's early years, Henry attempted to resolve the question of his succession. At this time it seemed unlikely that John would ever inherit substantial lands, and he was jokingly nicknamed "Lackland" by his father which he was never able to forget or forgive.
In 1173 when John was 7 years old, his elder brothers, backed by his mother Eleanor, rose in revolt against their father in a short-lived rebellion and their mother Eleanor was imprisoned for her role in the revolt. John had spent the conflict traveling alongside his father, and was given widespread possessions. Henry II began to find more lands for John, mostly at various nobles' expense. Henry dismissed the Lord of Ireland and replaced him with the ten-year-old John and gave him lands in England and on the continent. Following the failed rebellion of his elder brothers when he was only 7 years old, John became Henry's favorite child.
John's elder brothers died young. Henry the Young, the primary heir to the throne fought a short war with his brother Richard in 1183 and he died from inflammation of the intestines and colon in an terminal case of dysentery. With his primary heir dead, Henry rearranged the plans for the succession. Richard was to be made King of England. The war ended in stalemate and a tense family reconciliation. After Richard died 10 years later, John was proclaimed King of England.
In 1185 when John was 19 years old, he made his first visit to Ireland, accompanied by 300 knights and a team of administrators. Henry had tried to have John officially proclaimed King of Ireland, but the Pope did not agree. John's first period of rule in Ireland was not a success. Ireland had only recently been conquered by Anglo-Norman forces, and tensions were still rife between Henry II, the new settlers and the existing inhabitants. John infamously offended the local Irish rulers by making fun of their unfashionable long beards, failed to make allies, and began to lose ground militarily against the Irish. He finally returned to England blaming the viceroy for the fiasco.
The uncertainty about what would happen after Henry's death continued to grow. Richard was keen to join a new crusade and remained concerned that whilst he was away Henry would appoint John his formal successor. Richard began discussions about a potential alliance with Philip II in Paris and gave homage to Philip in exchange for support for a war against his father Henry. Richard and Philip fought a joint campaign against Henry, and forced him to make peace, promising Richard the succession. John initially remained loyal to his father, but betrayed him and changed sides once it appeared that Richard would win. Henry died shortly afterwards.
When John's elder brother Richard became king in 1189, he had already declared his intention of joining the Third Crusade. Richard set about raising the huge sums of money required for this expedition through the sale of lands, titles and appointments, and attempted to ensure that he would not face a revolt while away from his empire. The political situation in England rapidly began to deteriorate. When Richard still did not return from the crusade, John began to assert that his brother was dead or otherwise permanently lost. Richard had in fact been captured en route to England by the Duke of Austria and was held for ransom.
John seized the opportunity and went to Paris, where he formed an alliance with Philip. In 1194 the king finally returned to England, and John's remaining forces surrendered. John retreated to Normandy, where Richard finally found him later that year. Richard declared that his younger brother, despite being 27 years old, was merely a child who has had evil counselors and forgave him, but removed his lands with the exception of Ireland. For the remaining years of Richard's reign, John supported his brother on the continent, apparently loyally. Richard's policy on the continent was to attempt to regain through steady, limited campaigns the castles he had lost to Philip II whilst on crusade.
After Richard's death in 1199 there were 2 potential claimants to the throne: John, as the sole surviving son of Henry II, and the son of John's elder brother Geoffrey. Richard appears to have started to recognize John as his heir presumptive in the final years before his death, but the matter was not clear-cut and medieval law gave little guidance as to how the competing claims should be decided and the matter rapidly became an open conflict. John was supported by the bulk of the English and Norman nobility and was crowned at Westminster, backed by his mother, Eleanor. Arthur was supported by the majority of the french nobles and received the support of Philip II, who remained committed to breaking up the English territories on the continent.
After his coronation, John moved south into France with military forces and adopted a defensive posture along the eastern and southern Normandy borders. Both sides paused for negotiations before the war recommenced. Neither side was keen to continue the conflict, and following a papal truce the 2 leaders met in January 1200 to negotiate terms for peace.
John very soon became known as being very miserly especially with paying his soldiers and at the same time very extravagant towards himself. As king John felt that he could have and do whatever and whenever he wanted, particularly when it came to women. At the start of John's reign there was a sudden increase in prices, as bad harvests and high demand for food resulted in much higher prices for grain and animals. This inflationary pressure was to continue for the rest of the 13th century and had long-term economic consequences for England. The resulting social pressures were complicated by bursts of deflation that resulted from John's military campaigns. It was usual at the time for the king to collect taxes in silver, which was then re-minted into new coins; these coins would then be put in barrels and sent to royal castles around the country, to be used to hire mercenaries or to meet other costs.
Only 2 years into his reign, John treachery, lechery and greed and lustfulness was beginning to dominate and destroy the lives of his subjects. Isolated and paranoid, John knew he could never expect his barons` automatic loyalty, so he decided to use fear to guarantee it. He used debt as a chain to keep people under control.
At those times when John was preparing for campaigns in Normandy huge quantities of silver were withdrawn from the economy and stored for months without being minted. This resulted in periods during which silver coins were simply hard to come by, commercial credit difficult to acquire and deflationary pressure placed on the economy. The result was political unrest across the country. John attempted to address some of the problems with the English currency by carrying out a radical overhaul of the coinage, improving its quality and consistency.
John's royal household was based around several groups of followers who played an important role in organizing and leading military campaigns. Another section of royal followers were the senior officials and agents of the king and were essential to his day-to-day rule. Being a member of these inner circles brought huge advantages, as it was easier to gain favors from the king, file lawsuits, marry a wealthy heiress or have one's debts remitted. These posts were increasingly being filled by common foreigners from outside the normal ranks of the barons. This intensified under John's rule, with many lesser nobles arriving from the continent to take up positions at court. Many were mercenary soldiers who would become infamous in England for their uncivilized crude behavior.
At the age of 34, John decided to marry Isabella of Angoulême. John had fallen deeply in love with her and was motivated by desire for an apparently beautiful, if rather young, girl. The lands that came with Isabella were strategically vital to John providing a land route to Aquitaine. In order to remarry, John first needed to abandon Isabel, Countess of Gloucester, his first wife who could not produce him an heir. John accomplished this by arguing that he had failed to get the necessary papal permission to marry Isabel in the first place, as a cousin, John could not have legally wed her without this. Unfortunately, Isabella was already engaged and the resulting uprising was promptly crushed by John. Philip declared John in breach of his feudal responsibilities, reassigned all of John's lands that fell under the French crown and began a fresh war against John.
When war with France broke out in 1202, John achieved early victories, but shortages of military resources and his treatment of his nobles resulted in the collapse of his empire in northern France 2 years later. Further desertions of John's local allies at the beginning of 1203 steadily reduced John's freedom to maneuver in the region. He attempted to convince Pope Innocent III to intervene in the conflict, but Innocent's efforts were unsuccessful.
John spent much of the next decade attempting to regain these lands, raising huge revenues, reforming his armed forces and rebuilding continental alliances. John's judicial reforms had a lasting impact on the English common law system, as well as providing an additional source of revenue. An argument with Pope Innocent III led to John's excommunication in 1209, a dispute finally settled by the king 4 years later. John's attempt to defeat Philip a year later failed.
When he returned to England, John faced a rebellion by many of his barons, who were unhappy with his fiscal policies and his treatment of many of England's most powerful nobles. He seduced their wives and daughters and sisters. Although both John and the barons agreed to the written agreement called the Magna Carta neither side complied with its conditions.
Magna Carta was a charter agreed to by John. It drafted by the Archbishop of Canterbury to make peace between the unpopular King and a group of rebel barons, it promised the protection of church rights, protection for the barons from illegal imprisonment, access to swift justice, and limitations on feudal payments to the Crown, to be implemented through a council of 25 barons. Neither side stood behind their commitments, and the charter was annulled by Pope Innocent III, leading to the First Barons' War.
After John's death, the regency government of his young son, Henry III, reissued the document in 1216, stripped of some of its more radical content, in an unsuccessful bid to build political support for his cause. At the end of the war in 1217, it formed part of the peace treaty. Short of funds, Henry reissued the charter again in 1225 in exchange for a grant of new taxes. His son Edward I, repeated the exercise in 1297, this time confirming it as part of England's statute law.
The charter became part of English political life and was typically renewed by each monarch in turn, although as time went by and the fledgling English Parliament passed new laws. Both James I and his son Charles I attempted to suppress the discussion of Magna Carta, until the issue was curtailed by the English Civil War of the 1640s and the execution of Charles. The political myth of Magna Carta and its protection of ancient personal liberties persisted after the Glorious Revolution of 1688 until well into the 19th century. It influenced the early American colonists in the Thirteen Colonies and the formation of the American Constitution in 1787, which became the supreme law of the land in the new republic of the United States. Magna Carta forms an important symbol of liberty.
Civil war broke out shortly afterwards, with the barons aided by Louis of France. It soon descended into a stalemate. John died of dysentery contracted whilst on campaign in eastern England during late 1216. He was only 40 years old. Supporters of his son Henry III went on to achieve victory over Louis and the rebel barons the following year.
John had many faults as king, including distasteful and dangerous personality traits, such as pettiness, spitefulness, and cruelty. John took executive and sometimes arbitrary decisions, often justified on the basis that a king was above the law. Both Henry II and Richard had argued that kings possessed a quality of "divine majesty"; John continued this trend and claimed an almost imperial status for himself as ruler. During the 12th century, there were contrary opinions expressed about the nature of kingship. Many believed that monarchs should rule in accordance with the custom and the law, and take counsel of the leading members of the realm. There was as yet no model for what should happen if a king refused to do so.
One of John's principal challenges was acquiring the large sums of money needed for his proposed campaigns to reclaim Normandy. He had had 3 main sources of income available, namely revenue from their personal lands, money raised through their rights as a feudal lord, and revenue from taxation. Revenue from their personal lands was inflexible and had been diminishing slowly since the Norman Conquest.
Matters were not helped by Richard's sale of many royal properties in 1189, and taxation played a much smaller role in royal income than in later centuries. English kings had widespread feudal rights which could be used to generate income, including where feudal military service was avoided by a scutage cash payment to the king. He derived income from fines, court fees and the sale of charters and other privileges. John intensified his efforts to maximize all possible sources of income, to the extent that he has been described as miserly.
The result was a sequence of innovative but unpopular financial measures. John levied scutage in the absence of any actual military campaign, which ran counter to the original idea that scutage was an alternative to actual military service. John maximized his right to demand relief payments when estates and castles were inherited, sometimes charging enormous sums, beyond barons' abilities to pay. John initiated a new round of appointments, with the new sheriffs imposing increased fines and penalties.
Another innovation of Richard's, increased charges levied on widows who wished to remain single, was expanded under John. John continued to sell charters for new towns, including the planned town of Liverpool, and charters were sold for markets across the kingdom. The king introduced new taxes and extended existing ones.
The Jews, who held a vulnerable position in medieval England, protected only by the king, were subject to huge taxes. John created a new tax on income and movable goods, effectively an income tax. He created a new set of import and export duties payable directly to the crown, then he confiscated the lands of barons who could not pay or refused to pay the duties.
John was deeply suspicious of the barons, particularly those with sufficient power and wealth to potentially challenge him. Numerous barons were subjected to John's suspicions and jealousies. John rarely enjoyed good relationships with his barons. John was sinfully lustful and lacking in piety. What he lacked in humility and religious devotion, he made up for it in his sexual behavior. It was common for kings and nobles of the period to keep mistresses, but John's mistresses were married noblewomen, which was considered unacceptable.
John spent much of 1205 securing England against a potential French invasion. John reformed the English feudal contribution to his campaigns, creating a more flexible system under which only 1 knight in 10 would actually be mobilized, but would be financially supported by the other 9. Knight served for an indefinite period. John built up a strong team of engineers for siege warfare and a substantial force of professional crossbowmen. The king was supported by a team of leading barons with military expertise.
In the late 12th and early 13th centuries the border and political relationship between England and Scotland was disputed, with the kings of Scotland claiming parts of what is now northern England. John's father, Henry II, had forced William the Lion to swear fealty to him in 1174. This had been rescinded by Richard I in exchange for financial compensation in 1189.
The 2 kings maintained a friendly relationship, meeting in 1206 and 1207, until it was rumored in 1209 that William was intending to ally himself with Philip II of France. John invaded Scotland and forced William to give him control of his daughters and required a payment which effectively crippled William's power north of the border. By 1212 John had to intervene militarily to support the Scottish king against his internal rivals.
John remained Lord of Ireland throughout his reign. He drew on the country for resources to fight his war with Philip on the continent. Conflict continued in Ireland between the Anglo-Norman settlers and the indigenous Irish chieftains, with John manipulating both groups to expand his wealth and power in the country. During Richard's rule, John had successfully increased the size of his lands in Ireland, and he continued this policy as king.
In 1210 when John was 44 years old, he crossed into Ireland with a large army to crush a rebellion by the Anglo-Norman lords. He reasserted his control of the country and used a new charter to order compliance with English laws and customs in Ireland. John stopped short of trying to actively enforce this charter on the native Irish kingdoms and he might have done so, had the baronial conflict in England not intervened.
Royal power in Wales was unevenly applied, with the country divided and having many independent native Welsh lords of North Wales. John took a close interest in Wales and knew the country well, visiting every year between 1204 and 1211 and marrying his illegitimate daughter, Joan, to a Welsh prince and increased his own territory and power, striking a sequence of increasingly precise deals backed by royal military power with the Welsh rulers. A major royal expedition to enforce these agreements occurred in 1211 through the Welsh uprising. John's invasion, striking into the Welsh heartlands, was a military success and he expanded his power across much of Wales, albeit only temporarily. John became involved in a dispute with Pope Innocent III that would lead to his excommunication.
Previous kings had traditionally exercised a great deal of power over the church within their territories. From the 1040s onward, however, successive popes had put forward a reforming message that emphasized the importance of the church being governed more coherently and more hierarchically from the center. It established its own sphere of authority and jurisdiction, separate from and independent of that of the lay ruler. After the 1140s, these principles had been largely accepted within the English church, albeit with an element of concern about centralizing authority in Rome. These changes brought the customary rights of lay rulers such as John over ecclesiastical appointments into question. Pope Innocent was ambitious and aggressive and insistent on his rights and responsibilities within the church.
John wanted one of his own supporters to be appointed Archbishop of Canterbury, but the bishops challenged the appointment and the matter was taken before Innocent who instead appointed his own candidate. John was incensed about what he perceived as an abrogation of his customary right as monarch to influence the election. He barred the newly Pope appointed Archbishop from entering England and seized the lands of the archbishopric and other papal possessions. Innocent set a commission in place to try to convince John to change his mind, but to no avail. Innocent then prohibited clergy from conducting religious services, with the exception of baptisms for the young, and confessions and absolution for the dying in 1208.
John treated the interdict as the equivalent of a papal declaration of war. He responded by attempting to punish Innocent personally and to drive a wedge between those English clergy that might support him and those allying themselves firmly with the authorities in Rome. John seized the lands of those clergy unwilling to conduct services, as well as those estates linked to Innocent himself; he arrested the illicit concubines that many clerics kept during the period, only releasing them after the payment of fines. He seized the lands of members of the church who had fled England, and he promised protection for those clergy willing to remain loyal to him. In many cases, individual institutions were able to negotiate terms for managing their own properties and keeping the produce of their estates. By 1209 the situation showed no signs of resolution, and Innocent excommunicated John a year later.
This did not appear to greatly worry John as other kings had been excommunicated without suffering many consequences. He simply accrued significant sums from the income of vacant sees and abbeys. Around 14% of annual income from the English church was being appropriated by John each year.
Innocent gave some dispensations as the crisis progressed. Monastic communities were allowed to celebrate Mass in private from 1209 onward, and late in 1212 the Holy Viaticum for the dying was authorized. The rules on burials and lay access to churches appear to have been steadily circumvented, at least unofficially.
By 1213, John was increasingly worried about the threat of French invasion. Philip II of France had been charged with deposing John on behalf of the papacy. Under mounting political pressure, John finally negotiated terms for reconciliation, and the papal terms for submission were accepted. As part of the deal, John offered to surrender the Kingdom of England to the papacy for a feudal fee, as well as recompensing the church for revenue lost during the crisis.
This resolution produced mixed responses. Although some felt that John had been humiliated by the sequence of events, there was little public reaction. Innocent became a firm supporter of John for the rest of his reign, backing him in both domestic and continental policy issues. Innocent immediately turned against Philip, calling upon him to reject plans to invade England and to sue for peace. John paid some of the compensation money he had promised the church, but he ceased making payments in late 1214, leaving two-thirds of the sum unpaid. Innocent conveniently forgave this debt for the good of the wider relationship.
Tensions between John and the barons had been growing for several years, as demonstrated by the 1212 plot against him. Many of the disaffected barons came from the north of England. That faction was often labeled as "the Northerners". The northern barons rarely had any personal stake in the conflict in France, and many of them owed large sums of money to John. The revolt has been characterized as a rebellion of the king's debtors. Many of John's military household joined the rebels, particularly among those that John had appointed to administrative roles across England. Their local links and loyalties outweighed their personal loyalty to John. Tension also grew across North Wales, where opposition to the 1211 treaty was turning into open conflict. The failure of John's French military campaign in 1214 was the final straw that precipitated the baronial uprising during John's final years as king.
In 1214 John began his final campaign to reclaim Normandy from Philip. John was optimistic, as he had successfully built up alliances with many and was enjoying papal favor; and he had successfully built up substantial funds to pay for the deployment of his experienced army. Nonetheless, when John left for France, in 1214, many barons refused to provide military service. Mercenary knights had to fill the gaps. The first part of the campaign went well, with John outmaneuvering the forces and retaking the county of Anjou. Barons refused to advance and a peace agreement was signed in which John returned Anjou to Philip and paid the French king compensation. The truce was intended to last for 6 years.
Within a few months of John's return, rebel barons in the north and east of England were organizing resistance to his rule. John held a council in London in 1215 to discuss potential reforms. John appears to have been playing for time until Pope Innocent III could send letters giving him explicit papal support. This was particularly important for John, as a way of pressuring the barons but also as a way of controlling the Archbishop of Canterbury. In the meantime, John began to recruit fresh mercenary forces from Poitou, although some were later sent back to avoid giving the impression that the king was escalating the conflict. John announced his intent to become a crusader, a move which gave him additional political protection under church law.
Letters of support from the pope arrived in April but by then the rebel barons had organized. They renounced their feudal ties to John and appointed a military leader who under the name of "Army of God" marched on London, taking the capital. John's efforts to appear moderate and conciliatory had been largely successful, but once the rebels held London they attracted a fresh wave of defectors from John's royalist faction. John instructed his Archbishop to organize peace talks with the rebel barons.
A charter capturing the proposed peace agreement was written and named Magna Carta. The charter went beyond simply addressing specific baronial complaints, and formed a wider proposal for political reform, albeit one focusing on the rights of free men, not serfs and unfree labor. It promised the protection of church rights, protection from illegal imprisonment, access to swift justice, new taxation only with baronial consent and limitations on scutage and other feudal payments. A council of 25 barons was created to monitor and ensure John's future adherence to the charter, whilst London would be surrendered to the king.
Neither John nor the rebel barons seriously attempted to implement the peace accord. The rebel barons suspected that John would challenge the legality of the charter; they packed the baronial council with their own hardliners and refused to demobilize their forces or surrender London as agreed. Despite his promises to the contrary, John appealed to Innocent for help, observing that the charter compromised the pope's rights under the 1213 agreement that had appointed him John's feudal lord. Innocent obliged; he declared the charter not only shameful and demeaning, but illegal and unjust and excommunicated the rebel barons.
The failure of the agreement led rapidly to the First Barons' War. The rebel barons invited the French prince Louis to lead them. Louis had a claim to the English throne by virtue of his marriage to a granddaughter of Henry II. Philip provided him with private support but refused to openly support him, because Louis was excommunicated by Innocent for taking part in the war against John.
In 1216, when he was 50 years old, John contracted dysentery which ultimately lead to fatal inflammation of his bowels. In the aftermath of John's death William Marshal was declared the protector of John`s 9 year old son, Henry III.
The man, who would be known forever as Bad King John betrayed those closest to him, persecuted the innocent and he was the first king of England accused of murder. He feared not god, nor respected men. His punishments were refinements of cruelty, starvation of children, the crushing of old men. No woman was safe in his court. The legend of Robin Hood who stole from the rich and gave to the poor was born. Given to despair, John's subjects try to impose on him an agreement called the Magna Carta guaranteeing protection of their lives. Refusing to abide by it caused a desperate people into rebellion.
John of Gaunt was an English nobleman and member of the House of Plantagenet, the third of 5 surviving sons of King Edward III of England. As a younger brother of Edward, the Black Prince, John exercised great influence over the English throne during the riegn of Edward's son, King Richard II, and the ensuing periods of political strife. Due to some generous land grants, John was one of the richest men in his era.
John of Gaunt's legitimate male heirs, the Lancasters, include English kings Henry IV, Henry V, and Henry VI. John fathered 5 children outside marriage, one early in life by a lady-in-waiting to his mother, and 4 by Gaunt's long-term mistress and third wife. The 4 children surnamed "Beaufort," were legitimized by royal and papal decrees after John married her in 1396. Descendants of this marriage include all sovereigns of England, Great Britain and the United Kingdom from 1603 to the present day.
The 3 houses of English sovereigns that succeeded the rule of Richard II in 1399, the Houses of Lancaster, York and Tudor were all descended from John's children Henry IV, Joan Beaufort and John Beaufort, respectively. In addition, thru John's daughters, he is the ancestor of all subsequent monarchs of Spain, Portugal, and an ancestor of the Hapsburg rulers who would reign in much of central Europe.
John of Gaunt's eldest son and heir, Henry Bolingbroke, was exiled for 10 years by King Richard II in 1398. When John of Gaunt died a year later, his estates and titles were declared forfeit to the crown, since King Richard II had named Henry a traitor and changed his sentence to exile for life. Henry Bolingbroke returned from exile to reclaim his inheritance and depose Richard. Bolingbroke then reigned as King Henry IV of England (1399–1413), the first of the descendants of John of Gaunt to hold the throne of England.
John received the title "Duke of Lancaster" from his father in 1362 when he was 22 years old.. By then well established, he owned at least 30 castles and estates across England and France and maintained a household comparable in scale and organization to that of a monarch. He owned land in almost every county in England, a patrimony that produced a high net income.
In 1376 John of Gaunt contrived to protect the religious reformer John Wycliffe, to counteract the growing secular power of the church. However, John's ascendancy to political power coincided with widespread resentment of his influence. At a time when English forces encountered setbacks in the Hundred Years' War against France, and Edward III's rule was becoming unpopular due to high taxation. The Hundred Years' War was a long-running struggle from 1337 to 1453 between two royal dynasties, the Plantagenets of England and the Valois of France, for the throne of France.
The Plantagenet kings of England had historically held not only the English crown, but since 1066, also titles and vast tracts of land within France, due to their origins as French nobility. Over the centuries, Plantagenet holdings in France had varied in size, at some points dwarfing even the French royal domain. Seeing the danger this posed to their authority, the kings of France systematically sought to check the growth of Plantagenet power, stripping away titles and land as the opportunity arose.
By 1300, English holdings in France had been reduced to the Duchy of Aquitaine. It was an established principle that the Plantagenet rulers of England, despite being kings in their own right, were still vassals of the king of France for their continental fiefs, and therefore subject to the laws and judgments of the French crown, with respect to those lands.
The English had not expected their claim to meet with success, and did not press the matter when it was denied. However, political tensions between England and France arose 8 years later when England came into conflict with Scotland, a historical ally of the French. Philip VI pressured Edward III to make peace with the Scots, threatening the confiscation of Aquitaine if he refused. Edward III did not relent, and Philip VI declared the duchy forfeit. In response, Edward III proclaimed himself the rightful king of France, denounced Philip VI as a pretender, and declared war.
The English investment in the war had been so great, and its loss so shocking, that the resulting discontent erupted into the Wars of the Roses, a series of civil wars that ultimately ended the Plantagenet dynasty.
It was one of the most notable conflicts of the Middle Ages, in which 5 generations of kings from 2 rival dynasties fought for the throne of the largest kingdom in Western Europe. By its end, feudal armies had been largely replaced by professional troops, and aristocratic dominance had yielded to a democratization of the manpower and weapons of armies. Although primarily a dynastic conflict, the war gave impetus to ideas of French and English nationalism.
The wider introduction of weapons and tactics supplanted the feudal armies where heavy cavalry had dominated, and artillery became important. The war precipitated the creation of the first standing armies in Western Europe since the time of the Western Roman Empire and thus helping to change their role in warfare. With respect to the belligerents, in France, civil wars, deadly epidemics, famines, and bandit free-companies of mercenaries reduced the population drastically.
The Wars of the Roses were a series of English civil wars for control of the throne of England fought between supporters of two English rival branches of the royal House of Plantagenet: the House of Lancaster (associated with a red rose), and the House of York (whose symbol was a white rose). The conflict lasted through many sporadic episodes between 1455 and 1487. There was fighting before and after this period between the houses. The power struggle ignited around social and financial troubles following the Hundred Years' War, combined with the mental infirmity and weak rule of Henry VI which revived interest in Richard of York's claim to the throne.
When the Duke of York died, the claim transferred to his heir, Edward, who later became the first Yorkist king of England, as Edward IV. His son reigned for 78 days as Edward V, but Parliament then decided that Edward and his brother Richard were illegitimate and offered the crown to Edward IV's younger brother, who became Richard III. The two young princes disappeared within the confines of the Tower of London.
The final victory went to a claimant of the Lancastrian party, Henry Tudor, Earl of Richmond, who defeated the last Yorkist king, Richard III. After assuming the throne as Henry VII, he married Elizabeth of York, the eldest daughter and heir of Edward IV, thereby uniting the 2 claims. The House of Tudor ruled the Kingdom of England until 1603.
John died of natural causes when he was 59 years old.
Joan of Arc is considered a heroine of France for her role during the Hundred Years' War and was canonized as a Roman Catholic saint. Joan of Arc was born to a peasant family. She received visions of angels instructing her to support Charles VII and recover France from English domination late in the Hundred Years' War. The uncrowned King Charles VII sent Joan to the siege of Orléans as part of a relief mission. She gained prominence after the siege was lifted only 9 days later. Several additional swift victories led to Charles VII's coronation. This long-awaited event boosted French morale and paved the way for the final French victory.
In 1430, she was captured and later handed over to the English and put on trial by the pro-English Bishop on a variety of charges. After she was declared guilty she was burned at the stake dying at 19 years of age.
26 years later in 1456, in an inquisitorial court authorized by the Pope declared her a martyr. In 1803 she was declared a national symbol of France by the decision of Napoleon Bonaparte. She was beatified in 1909 and canonized in 1920.
The Hundred Years' War had begun in 1337 as an inheritance dispute over the French throne. Nearly all the fighting had taken place in France, and the English army's use of "scorched earth" raids had devastated the economy. The French population had not regained its former size prior to the Black Death of the mid-14th century, and its merchants were isolated from foreign markets. Prior to the appearance of Joan of Arc, the English had nearly achieved their goal of a dual monarchy under English control and the French army had not achieved any major victories for a generation.
The French king at the time of Joan's birth, Charles VI, suffered from bouts of insanity and was often unable to rule. The king's brother and the king's cousin quarreled over the regency of France and the guardianship of the royal children. This dispute included accusations that Louis was having an extramarital affair with the queen, and allegations that John the Fearless kidnapped the royal children. The conflict climaxed with the assassination of the Duke of Orléans in 1407 on the orders of the Duke of Burgundy. Henry V of England took advantage of these internal divisions and invaded the kingdom in 1415, winning a dramatic victory at Agincourt and subsequently capturing many northern French towns.
In 1418 Paris was taken by the Burgundians. In 1420 the queen of France, signed a treaty which granted the succession of the French throne to Henry V and his heirs instead of her son Charles VI. Henry and Charles died within two months of each other in 1422, leaving an infant, Henry VI of England, the nominal monarch of both kingdoms. Henry V's brother acted as regent. By the time Joan of Arc began to influence events in 1429, nearly all of northern France and some parts of the southwest were under Anglo-Burgundian control.
No one was optimistic that the city could long withstand the siege. For generations, there had been prophecies in France which promised France would be saved by a virgin from the "borders of Lorraine" "who would work miracles" and "that France will be lost by a woman and shall thereafter be restored by a virgin". The second prophecy predicating France would be "lost" by a woman was taken to refer to the treaty the queen of France signed granting the succession of the French throne to Henry instead of her son Charles.
Joan was the daughter of parents who owned about 20 hectares (200m x 1km) of land. Her father supplemented his farming work with a minor position as a village official, collecting taxes and heading the local watch. They lived in an isolated patch of eastern France that remained loyal to the French crown despite being surrounded by pro-Burgundian lands. Several local raids occurred during her childhood and on one occasion her village was burned. Joan was illiterate and her letters were dictated by her to scribes.
She experienced her first vision in 1425 at the age of 13, when she was in her father's garden and saw visions of figures of angels who told her to drive out the English. At the age of 16, she unsuccessfully petitioned the garrison commander for an armed escort to bring her to the French Royal Court. She returned a year later and gained support from 2 soldiers whom she told: "I must be at the King's side. There will be no help for the kingdom if not from me. Although I would rather have remained spinning wool at my mother's side yet must I go and must I do this thing, for my Lord wills that I do so."
Joan's first meeting with Charles took place at the Royal Court at Chinon in 1429, when she was aged 17 and he 26. After arriving at the Court she made a strong impression on Charles during a private conference with him. During this time Charles' mother-in-law was planning to finance a relief expedition to Orléans. Joan asked for permission to travel with the army and wear protective armor, which was provided by the Royal government. She depended on donated items for her armor, horse, sword, banner, and other items utilized by her entourage.
She was given a second meeting, where she made a prediction about a military reversal at the Battle near Orléans several days before messengers arrived to report it. Joan was granted an escort to visit Chinon after news from Orleans confirmed her assertion of the defeat. She made the journey through hostile Burgundian territory disguised as a male soldier.
After years of one humiliating defeat after another, both the military and civil leadership of France were demoralized and discredited. When Charles granted Joan's urgent request to be equipped for war and placed at the head of his army, his decision must have been based in large part on the knowledge that every orthodox, every rational option had been tried and had failed. Only a regime in the final straits of desperation would pay any heed to an illiterate farm girl who claimed that the voice of God was instructing her to take charge of her country's army and lead it to victory.
Upon her arrival on the scene, Joan effectively turned the longstanding Anglo-French conflict into a religious war, a course of action that was not without risk. Charles' advisers were worried that unless Joan's orthodoxy could be established beyond doubt, that she was not a heretic or a sorceress, Charles' enemies could easily make the allegation that his crown was a gift from the devil. To circumvent this possibility, the Charles ordered background inquiries and a theological examination to verify her morality.
The commission of inquiry "declared her to be of irreproachable life, a good Christian, possessed of the virtues of humility, honesty and simplicity." The theologians did not render a decision on the issue of divine inspiration. Rather, they informed Charles that there was a "favorable presumption" to be made on the divine nature of her mission.
Joan stated that she carried her banner in battle and had never killed anyone, preferring her banner "forty times" better than a sword and the army was always directly commanded by a nobleman. Many of these same noblemen stated that Joan had a profound effect on their decisions since they often accepted the advice she gave them, believing her advice was divinely inspired. The army enjoyed remarkable success during her brief time with it.
The appearance of Joan of Arc at Orléans coincided with a sudden change in the pattern of the siege. She was wounded by an arrow between the neck and shoulder while holding her banner in the trench outside les Tourelles, but later returned to encourage a final assault that succeeded in taking the fortress. The English retreated from Orléans the next day, and the siege was over. To the English, the ability of this peasant girl to defeat their armies was regarded as proof that she was possessed by the Devil.
The sudden victory at Orléans also led to many proposals for further offensive action. Joan persuaded Charles VII to allow her to accompany the army and recapture nearby bridges along the Loire as a prelude to an advance on the coronation of Charles VII. During the French assault at Paris, despite a wound to the leg from a crossbow bolt, Joan remained in the inner trench of Paris until she was carried back to safety by one of the commanders.
A truce with England during the following few months left Joan with little to do. She dictated a threatening letter to the Hussites, a dissident group which had broken with the Catholic Church on a number of doctrinal points and had defeated several previous crusades sent against them. Joan, an ardent Catholic who hated all forms of heresy together with Islam also sent a letter challenging the English to leave France and go with her to Bohemia to fight the Hussites, an offer that went unanswered.
The truce with England quickly came to an end. In 1430, Joan traveled to help defend the a city against an English and Burgundian siege. She was with a force that attempted to attack the Burgundian camp but was ambushed and captured. Joan was imprisoned and she made several escape attempts, on one occasion jumping from her 21m tower, landing on the soft earth of a dry moat. The English moved Joan to the city of Rouen, which served as their main headquarters in France.
The trial for heresy was politically motivated. The tribunal was composed entirely of pro-English and Burgundian clerics, and overseen by English commanders. It was a ploy to get rid of a bizarre prisoner of war with maximum embarrassment to their enemies.
The trial record contains statements from Joan that astonished the court, since she was an illiterate peasant and yet was able to evade the theological pitfalls the tribunal had set up to entrap her. The transcript's most famous exchange is an exercise in subtlety: Asked if she knew she was in God's grace, she answered, "If I am not, may God put me there; and if I am, may God so keep me." The question is a scholarly trap. Church doctrine held that no one could be certain of being in God's grace. If she had answered yes, then she would have been charged with heresy. If she had answered no, then she would have confessed her own guilt.
Heresy was a capital crime only for a repeat offense, therefore a repeat offense of "cross-dressing" was now arranged by the court, according to the eyewitnesses. Joan agreed to wear feminine clothing when she abjured, which created a problem. According to the later descriptions of some of the tribunal members, she had previously been wearing male clothing in prison because it gave her the ability to fasten her pants, boots and tunic together into one piece, which deterred rape by making it difficult to pull her pants off. She was evidently afraid to give up this outfit even temporarily because it was likely to be confiscated by the judge and she would thereby be left without protection. A woman's dress offered no such protection. A few days after her abjuration, when she was forced to wear a dress, she told a tribunal member that an English lord had entered her prison and tried to take her by force. She resumed male attire because her dress had been taken by the guards and she was left with nothing else to wear. The technical reason for her execution turned out to be a Biblical clothing law.
Eyewitnesses described the scene of the execution by burning in 1431. Tied to a tall pillar, she asked 2 of the clergy to hold a crucifix before her. An English soldier also constructed a small cross that she put in the front of her dress. After she died, the English raked back the coals to expose her charred body so that no one could claim she had escaped alive. They then burned the body twice more, to reduce it to ashes and prevent any collection of relics, and cast her remains into the Seine River.
Henry VI was King of England from 1422 to 1461 and again from 1470 to 1471, and disputed King of France from 1422 to 1453. The only child of Henry V, he succeeded to the English throne at the age of 9 months upon his father's death, and succeeded to the French throne on the death of his maternal grandfather Charles VI shortly afterwards.
Henry inherited the long-running Hundred Years' War (1337–1453), in which Charles VII contested his claim to the French throne. His early reign, during which several people were ruling for him, saw the height of English power in France, but subsequent military, diplomatic, and economic problems resulted in the decline of English fortunes in the war. Upon assuming personal rule in 1437, Henry found his realm in a difficult position, faced with diplomatic and military setbacks in France and divisions among the nobility at home.
Unlike his aggressive father, Henry is described as being timid, shy, passive, well-intentioned, and averse to warfare and violence. He was also at times mentally unstable. His ineffective reign saw the gradual loss of the English territories in France. As the situation in France worsened, political instability in England also increased. Henry allowed his government to be dominated by quarrelsome nobles, and failed to prevent the eruption of regional disputes between feuding noble houses, a situation worsened by his reliance on favorites to run affairs of the realm. This in turn angered sections of the nobility, already resentful of their king's inability to defend their lands in France.
Mounting problems led to increased political factionalism which, coupled with general misrule, helped to stoke unrest. Partially in the hope of achieving peace, in 1445 Henry married Charles VII's niece, Margaret of Anjou, an ambitious and strong-willed woman who would become an effective power behind the throne. The peace policy failed, leading to the murder of one of Henry's key advisers, and the war recommenced, with France taking the upper hand. By 1453, Calais was Henry's only remaining territory on the continent.
In the midst of military disasters in France and a collapse of law and order in England, the queen and the king's councilors came under criticism and accusations, coming especially from Henry VI's increasingly popular cousin Richard of the House of York, of misconduct of the war in France and misrule of the country.
Starting in 1453, Henry began suffering a series of mental breakdowns, and tensions mounted between Margaret of Anjou and Richard of York over control of the government of the weak and incapacitated king, and over the question of succession to the throne. Civil war broke out in 1459, leading to a long period of dynastic conflict known as the Wars of the Roses.
Henry's custody switched several times between both parties as his relatives fought for control of the throne. He was deposed in 1461 after a crushing defeat by Richard's son, who took the throne as Edward IV. Despite Margaret continuing to lead a resistance to Edward, he was captured by Edward's forces in 1465 and imprisoned in the Tower of London. Henry was restored to the throne in 1470, but Edward retook power in 1471, imprisoning Henry once again within a year.
Henry died in the Tower killed on the orders of Edward. William Shakespeare wrote a trilogy of plays about his life, depicting him as weak-willed and easily influenced by his wife, Margaret.
Henry was the only child and heir of King Henry V. He succeeded to the throne as King of England at the age of 9 months upon his father's death. A few weeks later he became titular King of France upon his grandfather Charles VI's death. His mother, only 20 years old was viewed with considerable suspicion by English nobles and was prevented from playing a full role in her son's upbringing.
Two years later, the nobles swore loyalty to Henry VI. They summoned Parliament in the King's name and established a regency council to govern until the King should come of age. One of Henry V's surviving brothers was appointed senior regent of the realm and was in charge of the ongoing war in France. During Bedford's absence, the government of England was headed by Henry V's other surviving brother who was appointed Lord Protector and Defender of the Realm. His duties were limited to keeping the peace and summoning Parliament.
Henry's half-brothers, Edmund and Jasper, the sons of his widowed mother and Owen Tudor their father were given earldoms. Edmund Tudor was the father of Henry Tudor, who later became Henry VII.
In reaction to Charles VII's coronation as French King in 1429, Henry was soon crowned King of England followed by his own coronation as King of France in 1431.
Henry was declared of age in 1437, at the age of 16 and he assumed the reins of government. Henry, shy and pious, averse to deceit and bloodshed, immediately allowed his court to be dominated by a few noble favorites who clashed on the matter of the French war.
After the death of King Henry V, England had lost momentum in the Hundred Years' War, while, beginning with Joan of Arc's military victories, the Valois gained ground. The young king came to favor a policy of peace in France, and thus favored the faction around Cardinal Beaufort and William de la Pole, who thought likewise, while Richard, Duke of York, who argued for a continuation of the war, were ignored.
Upon reaching 21 in 1442, and thus the legal age, Henry VI saw the question of his marriage gain importance in English politics. The heir presumptive at the time, the King's uncle saw his public image become severely damaged after his wife was arrested and tried under charges of witchcraft in 1441. This scandal seems to have highlighted the need for Henry VI to produce heirs of his own, and public focus began to place itself on the King and potential marriage plans.
Cardinal Beaufort and the Earl of Suffolk persuaded the king that the best way of pursuing peace with France was through a marriage with Margaret of Anjou, the niece of King Charles VII. Henry agreed, especially when he heard reports of Margaret's stunning beauty, and sent Suffolk to negotiate with Charles, who agreed to the marriage on condition that he would not have to provide the customary dowry and instead would receive the land of Maine from the English. The cession of Maine was kept secret from parliament, as it was known that this would be hugely unpopular with the English populace.
In 1447, the King and Queen summoned the Duke of Gloucester before parliament on the charge of treason. Queen Margaret had no tolerance for any sign of disloyalty towards her husband and kingdom, thus any inclination of it was immediately brought to her attention. This move was instigated by Gloucester's enemies, the Earl of Suffolk, whom Margaret held in great esteem, and the aging Cardinal Beaufort. Gloucester was put in custody where he died of a heart attack before he could be tried.
With the king's only remaining uncle dead, there were many, though no obvious candidates to succeed Henry VI to the throne in case he died childless. One candidate to the throne existed in the form of Margaret Beaufort, who was the heir general of the House of Lancaster thru Henry IV's semi-legitimate brother, John Beaufort. She would later marry Henry VI's maternal half-brother Edmund Tudor, and originate the Tudor claim to the throne.
The Duke of York, being the most powerful duke in the realm had the best chances to succeed. However, he was excluded from the court circle and sent to govern Ireland, while his opponents, the Earls of Suffolk and Somerset were promoted to Dukes, a title at that time still normally reserved for immediate relatives of the monarch. The new Duke of Somerset was sent to France to assume the command of the English forces; this prestigious position was previously held by the Duke of York himself, who was dismayed at his term not being renewed and at seeing his enemy take control of it.
In the later years of Henry's reign, the monarchy became increasingly unpopular, due to a breakdown in law and order, corruption, the distribution of royal land to the king's court favorites, the troubled state of the crown's finances, and the steady loss of territories in France. In 1447, this unpopularity took the form of a Commons campaign against William de la Pole who was the most unpopular of all the King's entourage and widely seen as a traitor. He was impeached by Parliament and Henry was forced to send him into exile. The ship was intercepted in the English Channel and his murdered body was found on the beach at Dover.
In 1449, the Duke of Somerset, leading the campaign in France, reopened hostilities in Normandy was soon pushed back. By 1450, the French had retaken the whole province, so hard won by Henry V. Returning troops, who had often not been paid, added to the lawlessness in the southern counties of England.
In 1451, the Duchy of Aquitaine, held since Henry II's time, was also lost. In 1452, an English advance in Aquitaine retook Bordeaux and was having some success but by 1453, Bordeaux was lost again, leaving Calais as England's only remaining territory on the continent.
On hearing of the final loss of Bordeaux in 1453, Henry experienced a mental breakdown and became completely unresponsive to everything that was going on around him for more than a year. Henry suffered schizophrenia and hallucinations. He even failed to respond to the birth of a son and heir, who was christened Edward. Henry inherited a psychiatric condition from Charles VI of France, his maternal grandfather, who was affected by intermittent periods of insanity during the last 30 years of his life.
The Duke of York, meanwhile, had gained a very important ally, Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick, one of the most influential magnates and possibly richer than York himself. York was named regent as Protector of the Realm in 1454. The queen was excluded completely, and Edmund Beaufort was detained in the Tower of London, while many of York's supporters spread rumors that Edward was not the king's son, but Beaufort's.
In 1454, King Henry regained his senses. Disaffected nobles who had grown in power during Henry's reign, most importantly the Earls of Warwick and Salisbury, took matters into their own hands. They backed the claims of the rival House of York, first to the control of government, and then to the throne itself (from 1460), due to York's better descent from Edward III. It was agreed York would become Henry's successor, despite York being older.
There followed a violent struggle between the houses of Lancaster and York. Henry was defeated and captured in 1460 but the The Duke of York was killed in battle and Henry was rescued from imprisonment. By this point, however, Henry was suffering such a bout of madness that he was apparently laughing and singing while the battle raged. He was defeated by the son of the Duke of York, Edward of York, who then became King Edward IV. Edward failed to capture Henry and his queen, who fled to Scotland.
During the first period of Edward IV's reign, Lancastrian resistance continued mainly under the leadership of Queen Margaret and the few nobles still loyal to her in the northern counties of England and Wales. Henry, who had been safely hidden by Lancastrian allies was captured by King Edward in 1465 and subsequently held captive in the Tower of London.
Queen Margaret, exiled in Scotland and later in France, was determined to win back the throne on behalf of her husband and son. By herself, there was little she could do. However, eventually Edward IV had a falling-out with 2 of his main supporters. At the urging of King Louis XI of France they formed a secret alliance with Margaret. After marrying his daughter to Henry and Margaret's son, Edward of Westminster, Warwick returned to England, forced Edward IV into exile, and restored Henry VI to the throne in 1470. However, by this time, years in hiding followed by years in captivity had taken their toll on Henry. Warwick and Clarence effectively ruled in his name.
Henry's return to the throne lasted less than 6 months. Warwick soon overreached himself by declaring war on Burgundy, whose ruler responded by giving Edward IV the assistance he needed to win back his throne by force. Edward IV returned to England in early 1471, after which he was reconciled with Clarence and killed Warwick. The Yorkists won a final decisive victory in 1471, where Henry's son Edward was killed.
Henry was imprisoned in the Tower of London again and when the royal party arrived into London, Henry VI was dead. Edward IV, who was re-crowned the morning following Henry's death, had in fact ordered his murder.
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